


Five Rules

by Your_Friendly_Neighborhood_Lesbian



Category: Original Work
Genre: Actually that applies to all races found in this story including humans, Gen, I used the name, I've been working on this for literally years, Just to be safe, M/M, Marley and Irma went through some p fucked up shit so, Watch out for that, a few rules and characteristics from the actual folk lore and mythology around them, abuse tw i think, and created my own beings sort of, and i'm p proud of it, another thing--, i did the bare minimum research, listen, so here it is in the flesh, so please don't use my story as a point of reference for literally anything, the Fae in this story are most definitely NOT a correct representation of the lore they are from, there will be fairly graphic violence and blood so, uhhh
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2018-12-25
Updated: 2018-12-27
Packaged: 2019-09-27 12:14:42
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 6
Words: 17,147
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17161799
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Your_Friendly_Neighborhood_Lesbian/pseuds/Your_Friendly_Neighborhood_Lesbian
Summary: There are five rules one must obey when interacting with faeries:The first is to be aware that names have power. Give yourself a nickname or give no name at all.The second is do not accept anything edible from a faerie. To eat from the land of the Fae is to lock yourself from the land of humans.The third is regarding information. If a faerie gives you information, do not thank them. You may say you appreciate their assistance, but thanking is tantamount to admitting a debt is owed.The fourth is about accepting gifts. Be very cautious when doing so, as many gifts will have unforeseen side effects. If a gift is offered, accept it, but if you do not trust who gave it, do not hesitate to destroy it. Salt water is always a good cleanser.The fifth is how to speak without offense. Most Fae are very old, and this means property is very important. Grudges can be held for centuries when you’ve lived for a millennia. If you do not wish to do something, the way you refuse can be critical. Be polite. Anything less can land you in hot water.This is the story of how Irma Enderel broke every single one of them.!!Hiatus!!





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> Ok so this is based off of a post I saw a really, really long time ago. I can't find the person who wrote it, in fact I can't find the post at all, but I don't want to take credit for something that is not mine. I did not write the rules, that was the post. However, I did wrote everything else. Most of the characters are mine, but Jeon, James, Lias, Khalil, and BLCK are my friends, used with permission. I think that's everything. Hope you enjoy!

There are five rules one must obey when interacting with faeries:

The first is to be aware that names have power. Give yourself a nickname or give no name at all.

The second is do not accept anything edible from a faerie. To eat from the land of the Fae is to lock yourself from the land of humans.

The third is regarding information. If a faerie gives you information, do not thank them. You may say you appreciate their assistance, but thanking is tantamount to admitting a debt is owed.

The fourth is about accepting gifts. Be very cautious when doing so, as many gifts will have unforeseen side effects. If a gift is offered, accept it, but if you do not trust who gave it, do not hesitate to destroy it. Salt water is always a good cleanser.

The fifth is how to speak without offense. Most Fae are very old, and this means property is very important. Grudges can be held for centuries when you’ve lived for a millennia. If you do not wish to do something, the way you refuse can be critical. Be polite. Anything less can land you in hot water.

These Rules are ultimate and to stray from them means almost certain death.

This is the story of how Irma Enderel broke every single one of them.

 

____________________

 

Irma was having a bad day. First, his prosthetic leg had gone on the fritz and it took him all night to fix it, second he missed his alarm and ended up being 20 minutes late to work. His boss screamed at him for another 30 about how he was bringing the whole company to its knees which was ridiculous because Irma was the only thing keeping the engineering sector afloat. Third, he was given a new project, which wouldn't have bothered him if he hadn't also been given an impossible due date. Three LFD’s by next Tuesday! It was already Monday! Didn't Sear know it took a week to make one?!

Irma sighed, already feeling the fatigue of all the all-nighters he would have to pull weighing on his eyelids. He pulled open the door to his workshop/bedroom, the unoiled hinges making a horrific screech. Irma winced and made a mental notes to oil them soon. He had told himself the same thing for weeks, but hey, maybe he would actually get around to it this time.

He stepped into the room, dodging around the strewn about tools and blueprints laying haphazardly around the room, making his way to his workbench, which was, as usual, covered in half finished inventions and machines.He rubbed the place where his thigh met metal, a nervous tick as well as a way to soothe the aching pressure his prosthetic caused him on bad days.

Irma sat down with a sigh, pulling his tools closer to him as he began to tinker, the familiar mask like shape of the LFD beginning to take shape. He lost himself in his work, the soothing motions of putting parts together and making something from nothing a balm to his frazzled nerves.

A shrill ringing broke his concentration and he startled, nearly falling from his bench. He flailed, grasping for the loud communicator laying a was away on the stone floor. He grabbed it and clicked the button, holding it to his ear.

“I-102 speaking,” he said, reverting back to his number. Technically, Irma wasn’t actually supposed to have a name. He was a lower class worker, more commonly known as C class, so he was only allowed a number.

But he had heard the higher and middle classes, A and B, calling each other things like Sean, and Emilia, and he had wanted something like that. He wasn’t sure where he had heard or read the word Irma, but it had seemed to click perfectly, almost effortlessly, so he had taken to referring to himself as Irma in his head. It helped keep himself at least a little more sane in his dreary life. Eventually he had constructed himself a full name out of bits and pieces of stray words and grammar.

Irma Enderel. Had a nice ring to it, if he was being completely honest with himself.

 _“You needa get down to them prisoners and check the LFDs. Boss-Man said they been actin’ real strange lately.”_ Irma was jerked from his thoughts as the crackly voice of Sear echoed over the communicator. _“I don’t want no work of ours gettin’ unreliable. It don’t reflect good on me.”_

“Yes, sir,” Irma answered, mentally groaning at the time he would lose for working on his LFDs. “I’ll be right down.”

Sear merely grunted and shut off the line. Irma sighed heavily and ran a hand through his curly brown hair, glancing down at the half finished blueprints. He pushed away from the desk and stretched before heading out his door and down to the detention center.

It wasn’t too long of a walk, seeing as all C Class workers resided on the bottom layer of the building, just above the detention cells. It honestly wasn’t so bad, even though the walls were always lined with rust and dirt, and the carpeted floor was ripped so he could see the cold concrete underneath and was perpetually covered in suspicious-looking stains.

Speaking of suspicious-looking…

A man stood at the end of the hallway, looking out of place in a way that felt like more than just the clothes on his back. He wore a large tan overcoat that blended into the wall and white scars crisscrossed his dark face. Black dreadlocks were pulled into a low ponytail, though a few had escaped the brown tie and framed deep brown eyes. Irma slowed to a halt when he neared him.

“What’re you doin’ down here, friend?” He asked conversationally. The strange man seemed startled, as if he hadn’t noticed Irma or he didn’t expect Irma to notice him. Dark eyes focused on him and Irma shifted uncomfortably under the heavy stare. Irma felt small, even though he was only about an inch shorter.

“I am looking for someone,” the man answered. He had a very nice voice, deep and smooth. It reminded Irma of caramel for some reason.

Irma chuckled. “Well, you won’t find more people in this building than here,” he said. The man looked at him closely.

“And why is that?” He asked, raising a thick brow. Irma nearly laughed in disbelief. Didn’t he know where he was?

“This place is run by robots,” he told him incredulously. “Jeez, man. More than half the world is robotic by now. This place isn’t an exception. Humans pretty much always work on the lowest level.” Irma shook his head and decided he had wasted enough time on this guy. He had a job to do, and he wasn’t willing to leave it incomplete.

“Anyway, I gotta be on my way,” he said, walking away. “Hope you find whoever it is you’re looking for.”

And with that, Irma put the strange man out of his mind.

 

____________________

 

He arrived at the bowels of the building without any further hold up, pushing the heavy metal door open and stepping into the cold chambers. Thousands of glass containers lined the walls, each holding a Faerie. The Fae were a despicable race. Many had seen the terror they wrought, the blood they split without a care. They were dangerous, fearsome predators who would bring ruin to the Earth and everyone who lived here.

Or, at least, that’s what he had been told.

Truthfully, Irma didn’t have an opinion on the Fae. They didn’t seem particularly dangerous, but his boss and even some of the C Classes he had befriended said that they were merciless killers who would commit genocide without any hesitation. Irma guessed that was as good a reason as any to help destroy all that had slipped through a tear in the Veil.

Even so, as he looked at the bloodied and broken Faeries that hissed or cowered as he passed their cages, he felt a pang of sympathy for them. Some of them might have just been in the wrong place at the wrong time, and didn’t want to harm anyone. But what did Irma know. He was just a C Class, and was in no place to disobey his superiors.

He walked to the split at the end of the hallway. Down the right end, another metal door stood proud, a small slit at the top, covered with iron bars. There was a sharp snapping sound and a loud, agonized scream tore through the air. A small Fae with wings colored like an oil spill and dark hair slammed against the glass wall of his container, leaving bloody streaks in his wake. He opened his mouth and screamed something, but Irma couldn’t hear him, since the glass cells were soundproof so that they could hear what was going on outside but their voice could never leave their cages, using his own design. Irma felt slightly sick.

He shook his head and turned down the left path, to an open room filled with machinery and heavy with the iron scent of blood. Masks covered with machinery lined the walls, looking out with empty, black tinted eyes. Yards of tubes hooked up to the mouthpiece and rough straps hooked around the back.

Irma sighed and took the first mask down, checking the machinery for imperfections or mistakes. The first one seemed fine, as did the second, and the third. Irma set the last one down and stared around the room in confusion. Everything was in order, so what was the Boss so concerned about?

Irma checked and double checked and triple checked, but nothing was out of place or broken. Although, Irma wasn’t even sure what the machines were supposed to do. When he had asked, he was sharply told to keep his nose in his own business. Irma rather thought that if he was supposed to be building these things, then it was his business to know what they did and how they were supposed to operate. How could he tell them if something was wrong if he didn’t know what to be looking for? Why did they send him down here anyway? Why not someone who knew what these stupid masks did?

Irma let out a frustrated sigh and combed a hand through his hair, turning and marching out of the full intention to go to Sear and tell him just what he thought about the LFDs. Or, at least, that was the plan.

He didn’t expect to run full steam into the same strange man who had lingered in the corners of his mind no matter how hard he had tried to push him out and away.


	2. Chapter 2

“What’re you doing down here!” Irma hissed, panic turning his blood to ice. “You can't be down here, my boss will have our heads! You ain't allowed down here without clearance and you can be damn sure they’re gonna blame me!”

The man didn't answer, just looked down at him with hooded eyes. The shadows in the room threw the angles of his face into sharp relief and his scars shone like quicksilver on his dark face. There was something different about him now, something dangerous and predatory. Everything in Irma’s mind was screaming at him to run, run and never look back.

But he had a job to do, and I-102 was nothing if not thorough.

“Sir,” Irma started, deciding to be polite. “You need to move so we can get out of here or we will get caught and I will throw you under the bus without hesitation.”

So much for polite.

The man blinked, maybe not expecting Irma to have such a mouth on him. Well he'd better get used to it because he still wasn't moving.

“I'm not sure you get it, man,” Irma tried again, subtly looking for ways to duck around him while also thinking up excuses to shove the blame off of himself and onto this mystery man. “If you don't get out of here right now, and we get caught, we run the risk of actually dying.”

“They would kill you as well?” The man asked, the question throwing Irma for a loop for a second.

“Hell yeah they would,” he scoffed. “I'm not so invaluable that they couldn't afford to get rid of me.” He heard a bit of self hatred slip into his voice and silently cursed himself. Now was not the time to stand around feeling sorry for himself.

“Dude--” his next attempt was cut short by the creaking of unoiled metal hinges. The smell of blood hit Irma so hard he almost staggered, before common sense kicked in and he grabbed the front of the man’s trench coat and dragged him in the LFD room with him, shutting the door as quietly as he could and praying to whatever god there might be that they hadn't been caught.

Irma placed a finger on his lips, warning the man to be quiet, before slipping around him and peaking through the thin eye hole in the door.

The door down the right hallway had opened up. A man had emerged, a leather apron stained with green blood covering his overalls and a ratty grey bandana covered the bottom half of his face. Cold blue eyes flickered over the hallways and Irma ducked back. He glanced out again, and the man had looked away.

He yanked something out of the room-- no, not something. Someone.

A Fae with limp purple wings and lilac hair was dragged out, leaving a streak of blood behind her. Her blue eyes fluttered and her breathing was ragged. Dark green was oozing from a nasty looking cut on her forehead, but Irma was willing the bet his good leg there were more wounds he couldn’t see. Irma swallowed heavily, breathing almost as shallow as the bleeding Fae’s. He felt his unexpected companion tense next to him and Irma looked over and promptly forgot to breath, a primal Fear freezing his heart in his chest.

His face was shadowed, but Irma could still see his eyes. They had turned almost as cold as the interrogator's, dark and terrifying. His whole body was taut with rage, his scars standing out thick and white against the shadows. His teeth were bared, canines way too sharp to be human. His hands clutched his jacket at the opening, as if trying to keep it closed against a raging wind.

Irma felt a tingling in his fingers, pins and needles spreading up his arms and down his legs. The hairs on the back of his neck stood up and every nerve in his body screamed at him to move! Irma flattened himself against the wall just as the man’s trench coat ripped in his hands and a gust a gale force wind ripped through the room, ripping the door off it’s hinges and smashing it into a hunk of useless metal. Had Irma not moved when he did, he would have been a grease stop on the far wall. But that wasn’t what Irma was worried about. Oh no, he was a bit to preoccupied with the thing that had been revealed when the trench coat came off.

Two things, actually.

Two large, gossamer, brown wings sprouted from the man’s back, tearing through the green tunic-looking shirt he was wearing.

“Oh my god,” Irma whispered, eyes wide.

“Ahalm?!” A scratchy voice croaked out. Irma turned and saw the purple winged Fae had regained some lucidity as was staring right at the man - Fae - winged person - Irma felt a headache coming on.

Ahalm stalked out of the doorway to the Fae, but more importantly, to the interrogator, who had already gotten over his shock and had pulled out a communicator.

“No!” Irma screamed and lunged forward, out of his hiding space and onto the interrogator, knocking both of them to the ground. The communicator fell to the ground with a clatter and skid across the room.

There was a brief moment of shocked silence. Then the interrogator kicked Irma in the stomach and the moment was gone.

Irma clutched at his stomach on the ground, black spots dancing in front of his eyes. The man stalked over to him and grabbed him by the shirt front, hauling him up so that they were face to face.

“Traitor,” the interrogator hissed, pulling his fist back. Irma had barely managed to let that insult sink in before the punch connected and the entire right side of his face exploded in pain.

Irma let out a groan of pain and reached up to scratch at the man's face. Luckily for him, and unluckily for the interrogator, Irma hadn't been able to clip his nails for weeks and they were ragged and sharp from days of non-stop work.

Irma raked his fingers down his attackers face and felt blood well up beneath his nails and heard the interrogator scream in pain, dropping him to clutch at his face. Irma used that time to pull his arm back and punch him square in the face.

The man dropped like a sack of bricks. 

Irma looked over to Ahalm, who was helping the lilac haired Fae to her feet. Irma stood up himself and took note of the scene in front of him. Two Fae, one recently freed, one who found his way down to the detention center most likely because he had followed Irma himself. The interrogator--

The interrogator had called him “traitor”.

It finally sank in completely.

Irma groaned in misery and clutched at his hair. He had just attacked a superior officer. He had been seen ‘helping’ an unregistered Fae, and when that got out he was gonna be hunted down and brought back for interrogation and he was gonna be tortured and his dead body was gonna be dragged out and and and--

“Are you ok?”

Irma let go of his hair to glare up at the strange man who was actually a Fae. He no longer looked murderous, but the two gigantic amber wing that fluttered behind him were impossible to ignore. The lilac haired Fae was leaning heavily on him, eyes glazed and uncomprehending.

“What the absolute hell do you think?!” Irma screeched. “I just attacked a superior officer and I practically lead a Fae into the most secure place in this building! It’s only a matter of time before they find out and they fucking kill me!”

Ahalm pointed to the unconscious interrogator, confused. “But he never alerted anyone. You could just walk out and pretend you never saw us.”

Irma almost went catatonic with rage. “He knows! He’s gonna wake up and he’s gonna tell everyone and I’m gonna be killed all cause ‘a you!”

Ahalm observed the unconscious interrogator and said, “I could get you out of here, if you do something for me.”

Irma scoffed. “Yeah, right. You’ll be killed before you even leave the first floor. No one leaves this place once you start working, unless you’re an A Class.”

Ahalm smirked. “Luckily, I never started working here.”

Irma stared at him long and hard for a second, considering. His options looked like this: He could either stay here and be killed for insubordination and fraternizing with the enemy, or he could go with a Faerie, a creature he had always been told were monsters, and live. Or maybe he would be killed on the way out or the Faerie just wanted to lure him away to kill him somewhere else.

“Fine. What do you need me to do?”

Ahalm nodded to the glass cages, adjusting his grip on the bloodied Fae leaning on him. “Can you open those?”

Irma scoffed. “Open them? I could deconstruct them completely in less than a minute.” At Ahalm’s look he rolled his eyes. “Yes, I can open them.”

“Good.” Ahalm walked quickly over to the cage the held the Fae Irma had seen earlier, the one with oil spill wings. As Irma looked closer, he saw the the Fae had long, blood matted black hair and unearthly pink eyes. He had stood back up at some point and was watching them all with wide eyes, palms pressed against the glass. He mouthed Ahalm’s name, shocked.

“Let him out,” Ahalm demanded. Irma scowled but went to work, and hardly a second later the entire front of the box popped off and the Fae practically fell out, wings fluttering and catching him. When he landed, Irma realized how short he was, barely reaching up to Irma’s chin.

“Ahalm!” The Fae cried and lunged forward, catching the taller Faerie in a hug.

“Lias!” Ahalm said back, hugging as best he could while still keeping an arm around the wounded purple girl. Lias pulled back and cradled the wounded Fae’s head in his hands, pressing his forehead to hers.

“Oh thank god,” he breathed. “It could have been so much worse.”

“Lias, where’s James?” Ahalm demanded. “We don’t have much time, we have to get him out and go.”

Lias nodded and stood straight, suddenly looking much more professional than Irma could ever hope to imitate. “Follow me,” he said, and lead them behind his own cage. The Fae they passed pounded on the glass and mouthed pleas to let them out, to free them, tears and green blood falling to the ground in tandem, but Lias and Ahalm just kept forging forward, Irma not far behind.

Soon enough they arrived at the back end of the rows of cages, where they kept the more unruly Fae. The cages here were soundproofed on both sides and were reinforced with a magnesium based alloy. Irma swallowed guiltily, because he had helped build these cages too.

The Fae sitting inside had his back to them, but Irma could see the power in his broad shoulders, and his wings, though folded down, were magnificent to behold, green and blue mixing in a beautiful swirl of color.

“Get him out,” Ahalm said and Irma went to work.

“This might take a minute,” Irma grunted, pulling wiring out of the opened control panel. He shielded his face as sparks flew. The faerie in the cage still hadn’t turned around, completely absorbed in his thoughts.

“Hurry up!” Lias hissed at him, glaring. Irma glared right back, ripping a handful of sparking wires apart and rewiring them.

“What the hell do you think I’m doing,” Irma muttered, turning back to his work. He twisted one more wire and a light dinged on. “Got it!”

Irma was shoved over by Lias, who yanked open the door and nearly smacked Irma in the face. “You’re welcome,” Irma said sarcastically. Lias completely ignored him.

“James!” He said, grasping the Fae’s shoulder. James spun around and, when he saw Lias, lunged forward and tackled him in a bear hug, knocking them both down the floor next to Irma, who had to scramble back to avoid being crushed. He bumped into Ahalm and Marley’s legs. Marley sent a kick back, but Ahalm offered a hand up.

James muttered something into Lias’ hair and Lias’ grip tightened. They didn’t seem to have any plans to move any time soon, but Ahalm coughed awkwardly and Marley let out a long, pained groan that sounded suspiciously like “I’m dying and y’all are hugging it out on the ground?” but was more likely _“uuuuuuuuuuu gggggggggggggghhhhhhhhhhhh”._

James’ head snapped up and he stood quickly, pulling Lias up with him.

“Oh my god Marley!” James cried, leaping over to her and, once again, Irma was shoved out of the way. Unfortunately, as James was, apparently, very strong, and Irma’s leg had been acting strange lately, when Irma hit the ground, once again landing on his bad leg, there was a loud snap sound and his leg popped right off.

“Oh my god!” Irma screamed, clutching his leg. James looked down and jumped three feet in the air, knocking into Ahalm and Marley, the former of which swore loudly at both James and Irma, and the latter grunted and swung a leg, missing James by about a foot.

“OH! Oh my GOD!” James shrieked, falling over himself. Irma rolled over, screaming, pulling on his leg.

“My leg! What did you do to my--” Irma paused and grinned, sitting up. He had freed his leg from his pant leg and held it up. “Nah I’m kidding. It’s fake.”

James stared at the mechanical leg for a long second. It was quiet, and all Irma could hear was the dripping of water from somewhere in the room. He looked around and fiddled with his leg. James said nothing, still staring at the fake leg in Irma’s hand.

“Ok I do need help getting up,” Irma said finally, breaking the silence.

“Why don’t you just put your leg back on?” Lias asked snidely, though he looked a little green around the gills.

Irma arched an eyebrow. “‘Cause I would need to take my pants off for that, and we’re not there in our relationship yet,” he replied blandly. Lias flushed green and huffed, looking away.

James still hadn’t said anything. He blinked, shook himself. He opened his mouth as if to say something, but closed it and turned away after giving Irma’s leg one last distrusting look.

Ahalm sighed and handed Marley off to James, who took her gently, careful not to jostle her wounds. He winced as his hand came away from her side stained dark green with her blood.

“Good gods, what did they do to her?” He muttered darkly. Ahalm shook his head and offered Irma a hand again. He hopped up on his one leg, the other cradled delicately underneath the arm not currently occupied.

“Alrighty, while this is all fine and dandy, could we please getta move on?” Irma asked. James and Lias looked to Ahalm, who was rummaging around in his pants pocket for something. He pulled out a small opal blade wrapped in ragged black leather. He turned, Irma moving with him and raised his hand high in the air and slashed down, ripping a tear into the very fabric of the air in front of them.

Through the rip, Irma could see rolling emerald hills, trees towering around them, the sky bluer than Irma had ever seen it. The few times Irma had looked up at the sky through a window, it was a disgusting shade of brown and grey, polluted to hell with the fumes from a world covered in industrial waste.

“Wait, is that--” Irma never had a chance to finish his sentence before alarms suddenly shrieked to life, startling the whole group. Marley’s head snapped up, blue eyes wide and clear.

“What the hell?” She yelled, voice raspy.

“Don’t worry about it!” James yelled right back.

“You know, you saying that only makes me worry more!”

“Let’s go!” Lias yelled, grabbing James and Marley and jumping through the veil. They disappeared in a shower of white sparks. Ahalm tugged Irma to the tear as well, but Irma dug his heel in.

“Wait, that’s the Land of the Fae!” He screamed. Ahalm grinned wildly.

“Yes it is! I promised you I would get you out!” He called over the sirens.

“Ahalm I can’t go there!” He cried. Ahalm laughed and pulled him to the tear.

“Sure you can! You’ve got me!”

“That doesn’t mean sh--”

And then Ahalm jumped into the veil, Irma stilling hanging on, and they disappeared in a fountain of white.


	3. Chapter 3

Irma’s first experience of the Land of the Fae was a short drop, a sudden stop, and a mouthful of dirt and grass. He groaned, suddenly all the more aware of the black eye the interrogator gave him and the bruises all over his body from where he had hit the ground, not once, not twice, but now three times. His thigh ached to hell and honestly this was just not Irma’s day at all.

He pushed himself up on his forearms, spitting out a mouthful of strangely sweet grass.

“Ugh,” he said, very eloquently. He felt hands on his shoulders and suddenly he was hefted up, and then his foot left the ground and he was facing a very pissed off James. “Oh sweet Jesus what.”

“Who the hell are you? Where the hell did you come from?” James hissed. Irma kicked his foot slightly, noticing his prosthetic lying not too far away.

“Uh, Zúñiga, Spain, I think. That’s what I was told, at least,” Irma replied. James gave him a startled look and shook him slightly.

“What the h-- no! That’s not--” he shook his head. “Who are you?”

“I-102,” Irma replied. Then his tilted his head, considering. “Well, actually, since I’m like, definitely fired, thanks by the way, I’m Irma. Irma Enderel.”

James dropped him. Irma hit the ground hard and sighed heavily.

“Would you please stop throwing me to the ground,” he complained. “You’ve already popped off one of my legs, I’d rather not lose the other one.” James didn’t even bother to respond, giving him a dirty look and stomping over to where Ahalm and Marley stood.

Irma hadn’t noticed before, but James was taller than Ahalm. He was broader and more muscular, too, and yet Ahalm carried himself with much more power, his spine straighter and his head held higher. Everyone in his group seemed to look to him for orders and leadership, treated him with the type of respect Irma had only seen granted to Class A generals before. It was intimidating.

James lifted off the ground, his wings glinting in the bright sunlight. They shone with shades of green, almost blending into the scenery around them. It looked like he was trying to make himself bigger, like threatened animals do when they were in danger. Irma rolled his eyes and struggled to his foot again, hopping over to pick up his leg.

“I’m gonna go put on my leg,” he called, but before he could take another hop to get behind a tree, Lias had appeared in front of him in a flash of oil spill wings and angry pink eyes. Irma took a startled hop back, almost falling over again before righting himself.

“You aren’t allowed out of our sight,” he growled, glaring up at him. Irma sighed and shook his leg in Lias’ face.

“I mean, jeez, if you wanted to see me without pants you just had to ask,” he deadpanned. Lias gave him a disgusted look. Irma rolled his eyes. “I’m not gonna run off on you once I get my leg back on, dumb ass. Where would I even go? I’m in a strange world I didn’t want to be in in the first place!” He raised his voice so that it reached Ahalm, who gave him the finger over his shoulder, busy with whatever it was that he was doing. Irma flipped him off right back even though Ahalm couldn’t see him.

“Then why are you here at all?” Lias demanded, taking another step forward. Irma didn’t move, refusing to be cowed by someone who was like a head shorter than him.

“Because Ahalm promised that he would keep me from bein’ killed after he bullheadedly attacked the interrogator and got me caught up in it,” Irma replied.

“Yeah, I saw that,” Lias said. “My cage was right next to the Room.” He spat the word ‘room’ like it was poison in his mouth. Irma felt a hot flush of guilt run through him at the mention of the cages. He swallowed against it and tried to get around Lias. Lias didn’t let him.

“Dude, if you don’t move, I will take my pants off right here and now,” Irma threatened. “I have no shame and I want my leg back on.”

“How’d you even lose it?” A voice asked from behind him. Irma did a weird flinch-skip movement and turned around to face Marley, who had snuck up behind him when he wasn’t paying attention.

She looked almost completely healthy again, the cut on her head gone entirely. Her purple wings fluttered behind her, sleek and narrow like dragonfly wings. She walked normally, without the slightest trace of pain, even though Irma was pretty sure she had had her guts held in by nothing by her hand and a prayer not even a minute ago. Her skin, a darky, woody shade of brown, looked practically pristine barring the green blood stained to her face and shirt. Even her lilac hair seemed shinier.

“You look better?” Irma said, phrasing it like a question.

“Well, yeah,” Marley scoffed. “Faeries heal faster than humans, especially in our home turf. How’d you lose the leg. You didn’t answer.”

Irma looked at his leg awkwardly, rubbing the stump of his thigh. “Accident,” he replied simply, not elaborating any. “Can I reattach my leg now?”

He didn’t actually wait for an answer before sitting down and yanking off his work pants.

“Oh, dude, come on!” Marley cried, shielding her eyes.

“I warned you! I warned all of you!” Irma defended. He looked down at the heavily scarred stump and huffed a breath before placing it in the indention on the top of his prosthetic. He hissed in pain as the leg shot bolts into his thigh, attaching wires to his nerves, or something along those lines. Irma had been completely out of it when the doctors explained the process to him, and no one had answered his question when he asked about it, saying they had already told him and it wasn’t their fault he couldn’t remember.

He had ripped off the doctor’s leg and built his own as soon as he could. It felt sick and tainted, poison against the twisted stump of bone and flesh.

He hopped up, yanking his pants on as he did so. He looked around at the faces of the Fae, each holding a different level of disgust and horror.

“Oh relax, I had on underwear didn’t I?” Irma rolled his eyes.

“Not that,” Ahalm said. He swallowed. “We have never seen someone without a limb. Our wounds heal fast and we are a peaceful people. We are rarely at war.”

“Peaceful?” Irma scoffed. “You’ve killed hundreds of humans.”

“And you’ve killed thousands of us!” Marley growled, taking a threatening step forward. Ahalm put an arm across her chest, stopping her, though his eyes were colder than they’d ever been. Irma glanced away and thought once again of the cages, of the LFDs, and though he had never been told what they did, he felt a hot flush of shame run through his body.

“Never mind that,” Ahalm said, even though his voice was strained with anger. “We must get to Edrinia. The Queen will want to know you have returned safely.”

“What about me?” Irma asked. “I can’t go to meet your Queen. She’ll kill me on sight, and you promised me that I wouldn’t die!”

“No,” Ahalm said. “I promised you would make it out of that building alive. What happened next was not part of our agreement.”

Irma felt like he had been doused in ice water, dread thumping in his chest like a second heart. He took a step back, only to bump into James. Ahalm dropped his arm and Marley advanced on him like a predator, teeth bared in a truly unsettling grin. Lias had taken to the air, wings flashing, ready to dart whichever way Irma tried to run.

Ahalm stood, outlined against the sun, wings lit like beacons, gaze trained on him, and Irma, not for the first time in his life, felt he had screwed up in a colossal way.

 

_________________

 

Marley watched Irma like a hawk. They had tied Irma’s arms and legs with a length of sturdy rope pulled from the pocket of the torn remains of Ahalm’s trench coat. Irma tugged lightly at his bonds.

“Why did you even have an entire length of rope just casually hanging out in your pocket?” He scowled at Ahalm, who neglected to give him an answer.

“Is everyone ready?” He asked instead.

“I’m not!” Irma cried. He was, once again, ignored. James walked over to him, the self satisfied smirk on his face making Irma want to punch him as hard as he could. He hoisted Irma up by the back of his shirt and before he had time to react, grabbed him by the waist and threw him over his shoulder in a crude fireman’s carry.

“Is this really necessary?!” Irma yelped indignantly, wiggling a little bit. James thumped him hard on the back and Irma shut up, scowling heavily.

“This is just pettiness at this point,” Irma hissed, just loud enough for James to hear. James didn't deny it.

“Let's go,” Ahalm said, spreading his wings and lifting off. In that moment, Irma had a sudden and violent realization.

“We’re flying?!” He tried to scream, but it came out as more of a horrified choked off gasp. He renewed his struggling with a vengeance as James started to lift off.

“Dude stop you’re gonna make me drop you,” James snapped, grabbing onto Irma’s legs in an attempt to stop them from kicking him in the face.

“We’re flying?!” Irma said again, and this time it came out as a god awful screech of fear.

“You’re gonna be falling if you don’t stop moving,” James shouted and Irma immediately fell still, hardly daring to move an inch as James rose further and further up.

Don’t throw up don’t throw up don’t throw up, Irma repeated to himself silently as he watched the ground get further away until even the trees looked like a child’s toy. Irma squeezed his eyes shut and tried not to whimper to loudly.

He hated heights. An understandable fear in his mind. People just weren’t meant to be in the sky in any way shape or form. They were born without wings for a goddamn reason and Irma maintained that the only things that should be able to fly were birds and literally nothing else.

“Fucking Fae,” he whispered.


	4. Chapter 4

Irma’s first view of the city of Edrinia was upside down and blurry. He probably would have been more awestruck by the engineering needed to build a city into the side of a tree, but at the moment he was a bit more impressed by his own ability to keep his lunch down, as it were.

It really was a beautiful city though, completely built into the side if the biggest tree Irma had ever seen, larger around the trunk than two Organisation buildings put together and twice as tall. Then James started to rise again and Irma had to once again focus on not throwing up.

The group and Irma flew to the very top the tree, into the dense branches. James landed on a branch that was easily as wide as a two lane highway, and Irma slid down onto the wood with a cry of joy. He kneeled on the sun warmed wood, pressing his forehead to the smooth bark and thanking every god he knew of, human or otherwise, for the steady feeling of being back on firm ground. He tried not to think about the fact that they were still miles above the actual ground.

“Get up,” Marley barked, grabbing Irma’s bicep and yanking him up none-too-gently. Irma yelped at the tight grip and glared at Marley, angrily noticing she was at least an inch taller than him. She returned the glare ten fold and dragged him down the branch to the trunk, where the rest of the group were waiting impatiently, in front of the largest door Irma had ever seen, made of dark green wood and perfectly round.

She let go of his arm, but Irma’s witty retort died in his throat when he finally saw the sheer magnitude of the tree they were on. Irma could have given the trunk a hug and he wouldn’t have even been close to the curve of it. In fact, when he looked out to the left then right, he couldn’t even see where the trunk curved, his view blocked by branches even bigger than the one they were currently standing on.

He looked over the edge of the branch and for a moment, his wonder completely overwhelmed his fear of tipping forward over the side and plunged down head first.

Every branch he could see was used like a street, more Fae than he had ever seen flying and walking all over the place, their wings every color Irma could think of and then some. Carts were set up, some carrying a delicious smell with them, like every good thing Irma had smelled in his life, every good memory he’d ever had all forced into one smell. Others had shimmering fabrics on sale, glinting in the dappled sunlight with a sparkle more beautiful than Irma had ever seen, coming from a place were the only colors were brown, grey, slightly lighter brown-grey, slightly darker brown-grey, and black. There were even houses built on the trunk, hanging precariously over the edges of the branches, or stacked on top of one another. At the base of each branch, large, perfectly shaped holes lead into the trunk, gentle light spilling out of them in soothing blues and purples.

“Oh, wow,” Irma whispered, barely audible to his own ears. Then vertigo hit and he scrambled away from the edge, back towards the green door and the rest of the group. Lias curled his lip at Irma’s panicked backwards flail and grasped the bronze handles in the middle of the doors, wrenching them open and entering without a word, Marley and James following. Ahalm raised an eyebrow and bowed mockly at the door, sweeping his arms wide. Irma flipped him off and walked in, pretending not to hear Ahalm’s chuckles.

He entered into a huge tunnel, lit by floating flames. Not like flames in torches, but literal balls of dark blue flames, hovering an inch away from the wall, each about a foot away from one another. Irma took a deep breath and refused to acknowledge them.

The tunnel itself was carved directly out of the tree, though the bark looked to have been smoothed. The floor they were walking on was curved, so they had to stay in a straight line unless they wanted to twist their ankles. It was completely barren besides the floating fire, which Irma still refused to look at, and the air was damp and cool.

Soon enough, they arrived at yet another door, this one rectangular and red, with a bronze door knob in the direct center. Lias twisted it and pulled it open, though he let go as soon as there was a crack and pulled it open the rest of the way by the door side.

“God I hate that stupid doorknob,” he grunted, yanking. James laughed and helped Lias pull it open. Lias glared at him. “I had it.” James shot him a thumbs up and followed Lias through the door.

Irma leaned back to Ahalm, a question on the tip of his tongue. “Are they dating?” He whispered. Ahalm shrugged vaguely with a helpless sort of look on his face. Irma let out an ‘ah’ of understanding before Marley leaned back and, once again, yanked Irma forward by the arm.

“Ok, first of all, ow,” Irma complained. “Second, what is with you and arm grabbing.”

Predictably, Marley didn’t answer.

As Irma was dragged through the door, he found himself in a huge room with no ceiling, just branches growing overhead in a mimicry of one. Sunlight shone through the gaps of the leaves and sent sunspots dancing across the floor, which was still smooth bark. The room itself was round, with crystals of all colors dangling from the walls or just hovering around. Looking closer at the branches spreading overhead, Irma could see straps of fabric fluttering in the breeze. Some looked like they had been torn from a shirt or dress or some other article of clothing, while others were braided like bracelets.

What worried him more, however, were the heavily armored guards that stood at attention all around the room, each holding a sharp tipped spear with a sword strapped at their waists. The two meanest looking ones stood on either side of three thrones, only two of which were occupied.

The Fae on the bigger of the two thrones, the one that looked like it had been grown right from the floor itself, was the most intimidating woman Irma had ever seen in his life. She had eyes like a kaleidoscope, the colors swirling and changing, and they would have been beautiful if they weren’t focused on Irma with such an intense distrust. Her skin was just a shade darker than the tree around them and her black hair was held up in a complex series of braids Irma couldn’t even begin to make heads or tails of, a silver crown decorated with blue gems nestled within. Her outfit was a simple blue gown, but she sat with such regality and power it seemed like full battle regalia. In her hand was a staff made of grey, twisted wood, topped with a glowing white crystal. Her wings were massive, bigger than any Irma had seen so far, and they glittered blue and green, like what Irma assumed the sea looked like from pictures he only caught glimpse of.

The figure next to her was much smaller, sat on a throne of multicolored crystal. Irma was starting to wonder what their obsession with crystal was. He had messily cut brown hair and olive colored eyes, watching them all with a face as cold as stone, yet colored like the sun, golden and warm, though Irma swore he saw a glimmer of relief when his eyes swept over the Fae of their group. A simple gold circlet rested on his head, a single emerald green gem embedded in the front. His wings, while less impressive than, Irma was assuming, the Queen’s, were beautiful in their own right, a golden green color, wide and curved like a butterflies. He wore light silver armor, two sheathed swords resting against his throne.

Lias, James, and Ahalm were already kneeling by the time Irma snapped out of his, admittedly rather dramatic, thoughts. Marley kicked the back of his knees and he collapsed, muffling a groan of pain when he landed hard in a mockery of the bow, Marley kneeling gracefully beside him.

“Welcome back, Captain Ahalm,” the Queen spoke, her voice silky and deep. Irma swallowed hard, trying to fight back the fear growing in his chest like a parasite.

“I see you were successful in your mission,” the other Fae spoke and Irma did a double take because that was not a male voice. He looked up at the, apparently genderless, Fae, only now noticing their more feminine features. He quickly looked back down, trying not to swear out loud.

He heard a rustle of cloth as Ahalm rose. “I thank you for your gracious welcome, your Highness. I am pleased to announce that Heir Jeon is correct. The rescue mission was a success in the fullest. Marley was injured in the Human Realm, but since arriving home, has healed quickly,” he reported.

“Who is the fifth member of your party?” The Queen asked, cold as ice. “I see no wings, and I’m assuming he never had any. Surely you did not bring a human, not only into the Land of the Fae, but directly into the heart of our kingdom.”

Ahalm flinched and swallowed. “I did your Highness. His name is Irma, and he was caught in the middle of my rescue mission. He helped me free Marley, Lias, and James in return for his safe passage out of the building, as he, too, would have been killed if he had stayed for betraying his people.”

The Queen was quiet for a moment. “There is something else, is there not, Ahalm,” she said, not phrasing it as a question.

Ahalm hesitated for a second, then said in a quiet voice, “He was able to see through my glamour.”

Irma felt Marley flinch beside him and heard Lias swear quietly. The Heir swore, too, though it wasn’t quiet. All Irma felt was confusion. What was Ahalm talking about? What was a glamour? Irma hoped it wasn’t that ratty magic trench coat, because that would have just been embarrassing.

He chanced a glance up at the Queen and saw she had risen to her feet, wings twitching agitatedly behind her. She looked at him and lifted off, landing gently in front of Irma, who just about had a heart attack.

He leaned back to meet her eye, sweating nervously. “Ma’am,” he said with as much respect as he could muster from his rude, sarcastic demeanor. It was a surprisingly large amount, though the fear of repercussion might have helped. She glared down at him, the sun filtering through the branches above giving her a scary backlight, making her look more like a spirit of Death than a benevolent Faerie Queen. Irma quietly began writing his will.

“Rise,” she commanded, and Irma didn’t even hesitate, practically jumping to his feet and taking a step back, because holy hell she was taller than James. The staff in her hand was level with the top of his head and that was intimidating. 

“Who are you?” She asked.

“Uh, I-102,” he said, automatically reverting to his serial number in the face of overwhelming authority. He mentally slapped himself. “I mean, Irma Enderel.”

The Queen raised a single eyebrow down at him and Irma had to resist the urge to scream and run away as fast as he could, which took a lot more willpower than he expected.

“Who are your parents?”

Irma blinked, a bit blindsided by that question. “I have no idea,” he answered honestly. “I mean, they might be dead now? I’m not sure, but I think I was born in the Organization.”

It was the Queen’s turn to blink in confusion. “How could you possibly not know your parents?”

“Well, I was taken as a baby, and you don’t really develop memories until you’re three, and they may have been killed, so really there’s a lot of reasons I don’t know my parents,” Irma rambled, not noticing Ahalm cutting his hand across his throat in the universal gesture for ‘Shut up!’.

The Queen scowled at him and raised her staff. Irma sent a quick prayer to a god he didn’t even believe in and kissed his ass goodbye. But all that happened was a guard flying forward - and man, Irma was not used to that - and landing next to his Queen.

“Take him to the Room of Grass,” she commanded. The guard seemed confused, but did as he was asked anyway, grabbing Irma’s arm and pulling him along.

“Good god, what is with you people and grabbing, pulling, and all variations thereupon?!” Irma complained. “I may not have a leg but I can walk! And please ignore how contradictory those statements are!” The guard stared at him, apparently just as gobsmacked as Ahalm, James, Lias, and Marley when his leg popped off. He heard the Heir behind him mutter a quiet, “What the hell,” before a sharp glance from the Queen spurred the guard into pushing him out the door.

He heard the Queen’s staff pound against the ground and her shout, “What did you bring into my kingdom, Ahalm!?” before the door slammed shut and blocked out all sound coming from the throne room.

The guard lead him through several winding corridors, each just as expensively decorated as the last, the walls carved with swirling patterns that glowed with a green light, a glass over the carvings that made Irma want to reach out and touch. Of course, when he tried to, the guard slapped his hand with the shaft of his spear. His knuckles still throbbed.

Finally, they made it to a door, another circle, with a blade of grass carved into the wood from bottom to top, almost stupidly realistic and detailed. The doorknob was metal, curved out from the door in a gentle arc. The guard opened the door and tossed Irma in before slamming it shut without a word.

“Rude,” Irma muttered, straightening out his shirt before looking around the room he had been thrown in. It was less like a cell than he had been expecting, the wooden floor lit up by the same glowing green carvings as on the walls of the hallways. Irma looked over his shoulder at the closed door and dropped to the floor, running his hands all over the glass covered lines.

It was extremely satisfying.

After having his fill of honestly rather tame rule breakage, Irma stood and surveyed his surroundings a bit more thoroughly. There was a small bed in the far corner of the room, already so much more comfortable looking than anything he had seen before, with a dark green comforter and a small headboard pressed flush against the wall. A small table was on the other side of the room, nothing on it, though a stool was placed in front of it. The only light source was a big chunk of glowing purple crystal embedded in the ceiling.

“Seriously,” Irma whispered to himself. “What is with all the crystal?”

And then he broke down.

In less than 12 hours, he had been ripped away from everything he knew, branded a traitor by the Organization, helped release the things that were supposed to be genocidal maniacs, been caught and basically imprisoned by said maniacs, discovered that those same exact maniacs might not actually be maniacs, and feared for his life more times than could really be considered healthy in that short of a time span. Irma felt like having a meltdown was almost anticlimactic.

He ended up curled in on himself on the bed, facing the wall with a tear soaked pillow in a death grip when he finally came back to himself. He took a couple deep, shuddery breathes and tried to stop the shaking in his hands, and though he wasn’t entirely successful, it was good enough for him.

He put the pillow back down into its place, wet side down, and wiped at his face, getting rid of any and all traces of tears or of his minor mental collapse. He wished there was a sink or a mirror or something in his room, so he could be sure he didn’t look like a complete wreck, but by now he was pretty confident in his ability to bullshit and hide his emotions behind an impenetrable wall of meaningless rambles and sarcasm.

He stood and straightened out his clothes and the bed covers when the door to the room creaked open. Irma spun around, shoving his hands in his pockets to hide the shaking and putting on a neutral face, hoping that the redness around his eyes wasn’t too noticeable.

The Heir entered the room, Marley trailing behind them dutifully, a large battle axe strapped to her back. Irma glanced between the two of them, noticing that the Heir looked somehow even more cold and uncaring than they did in the throne room. The two swords from before were now strapped to their waist and honestly he was a bit tired of fearing for his life from various members of the Royal Family.

“Uh, hi?” Irma said awkwardly, not really knowing what the proper procedure was in this situation. Judging by Marley’s almost pained grimice, it wasn’t that. Well Marley could just suck it.

“Hello,” the Heir said, their voice strong and proud. “I have a few questions.”

Irma sighed heavily and sat back down on the bed, leaning into the wall. “Alright, sure, whatever,” he said dully, suddenly too tired to even pretend to care. “What’d you wanna know?”

If the Heir was surprised by his lack of resistance, they didn’t show it. “What can you tell us about the Human Realm?”

Irma snorted, a sardonic laugh slipping past his lips.

“What’s so funny, Irma Enderel?” Marley demanded. Irma felt a strange jolt in the back of his mind when she spoke his name, a strange force compelling him to tell. Irma didn’t pay it much mind, writing it off as a delusion of his worn out mind. He was planning on telling the truth anyway.

“It’s just, you keep calling it the ‘Human’ Realm, but it’s pretty much all mechanically run over there. Less that half of the population is still human, and we never have any substantial power. Most of us are treated like slaves.” He explained. “Though I guess there are a handful in Class B who are given some power. They get a name, at any rate.” He shook his head, confused. He didn’t mean to say all of that.

“When did this happen?” Jeon demanded, eyebrows furrowed. Their wings twitched agitatedly behind her, catching the light of the crystal.

Irma shugged. “Before I was born, but that’s all I know. They don’t exactly teach you history in the Engineering department.”

Marley blinked, seeming to come to some sort of realization. She narrowed her eyes at Irma, a scowl twisting her lips and showing her teeth. She opened her mouth, but before she could speak, Jeon asked,

“Do the robots in your Realm know where the tear in the Veil is?”

“I… don’t think so? I mean, you really shouldn’t take my word for it. I was Class C -- before you ask, that’s the lowest class -- so they don’t exactly tell me stuff.” He explained, but he wasn’t focused on the Heir anymore. Jeon was no longer the biggest threat in the room. Oh no, that title belonged to Marley, whose hand was gravitating to the handle of her axe, her eyes fixed on him in a glare that chilled him to the bone.

“Irma Enderel,” Marley growled, and once again Irma felt the tugging in the back of his head, stronger this time, compelling him to do whatever was asked of him. The feeling made him want to throw up, the shaking in his hands returning with a vengeance. “What did you build for your Organization.”

And in that moment, Irma knew he was well and truly screwed.


	5. Chapter 5

Khalil was not having a good day. In fact, it could be said that Khalil was having an absolutely sucky day. A terrible, no good, very bad day. Like, sure, Khalil had had bad days before. The day he got his skull knocked in definitely qualified as ‘bad’, as did the day he met BLCK and consequently discovered just how much he could hate a robot, but this day really took the cake.

“I’m sorry, he did what?” Khalil asked, trying very hard not to drop his head into his hands and scream.

His superior officer - a robot called SPEAR - didn’t seem like she cared about Khalil’s obvious distress, though even if she did Khalil wouldn’t have been able to tell, what with the fact that her metal face plate didn’t allow for different facial expressions and her voice was the same tinny, mechanical whine that only allowed for vaguely female monotone speech.

“I-102 brought a Fae into the detention center, knocked an interrogator unconscious, freed the three Fae you had brought in a week ago, and escaped with them through a portal into the the Land of the Fae,” SPEAR repeated. Khalil nodded slowly, trying desperately not to think of just how hard it had been to capture those three Fae, and just how proud he had been when he had finally brought them in.

“I’m assuming you want me to take care of I-102 and the Fae,” Khalil said. SPEAR shook her head and leaned forward, crossing her arms against the metal table with a clink.

“Agent K-702, what you are about to hear does not leave this room. If you speak of this beyond myself and your partner, you will be silenced swiftly and efficiently,” SPEAR said, the blue LED lights she called eyes boring into his own.

“Wait, ‘partner’--” Khalil started to ask before deciding there were better things to worry about. “I mean, of course. I won’t breathe a word.”

“Good.” SPEAR leaned back before gesturing over to the closed door at the far end of the room. It slid open with a woosh, and a large black humanoid robot strode in. It’s glass visor of a face turned to Khalil and he felt a burning hatred sweep through him, his face automatically crumpling into a scowl. He turned to SPEAR, turning his back on BLCK, and refused to even acknowledge the robot. BLCK walked to the table and sat down in the chair next to Khalil, also joined in on his intense game of denial.

SPEAR leaned forward again. “BLCK, you are already aware of the consequences of speaking outside of this room,” she said, the question more of a phrase.

“Yes, I know,” BLCK responded. Khalil scowled even harder, hating the fact that BLCK had the ability to sound even slightly human.

“Good. Gentlemen, we have located the original tear in the veil that separates this word from the Land of the Fae,” she said. If she had been able to express joy, Khalil was sure her voice would have been practically dripping with glee. As it was, she only had one voice setting, so the statement didn’t carry as much dramatic weight as it could have. “Your mission, and you are not given a choice as to whether or not you’ll accept it, is to infiltrate the Land of the Fae, do reconnaissance, find out who is the leader, and kill I-102 by any means necessary.”

Khalil felt excitement thrum through his veins, and he felt BLCK shift beside him. A shark like grin threatened to split his face and he clasped his hands together on the table to keep them from shaking.

“When do we start?” BLCK asked, a thread of sadistic pleasure humming beneath the words. SPEAR rose from the table, standing to her full 6’6 height. She jerked her head in a gesture to follow her and Khalil and BLCK stood as well, following her as she walked through the door.

“You start now.”

 

________________________________

 

As it turns out, that was a bit of an exaggeration. They did not, in fact, get to start ‘now’. In actuality, they had to wait a couple of days for the transport to be approved by who ever it was that was above Class A, and then they had to wait a couple more days on the transport because apparently the tear in the Veil was farther away that Khalil had expected and SPEAR had decided to let on.

All of this accumulated into a very frustrating week of waiting and preparing. Khalil spent nearly every moment of his time at the shooting range, practicing with a whole arsenal of guns, or at the gym, brushing up on his, admittedly sub-par, hand to hand combat. However, BLCK had a similar idea in mind, so only a day after Khalil started going to the gym, BLCK took it over.

Khalil swears he’s just doing it to piss him off.

Finally, after the hell week, they made it to the day they actually got to get started. Khalil stood in front of the gigantic tear that hovered in mid air. It glowed white, just on the right side of blinding, it's sides frayed and ragged like cloth ripped by an uncaring hand. Strings hung like cobwebs, blowing ever so slightly in a breeze Khalil couldn't feel. Its sides were connected by thin strands of the same cobweb-like material.

Khalil could see into the Land of the Fae for the first time, and, honestly, he felt just a tad underwhelmed. There were no strange, exotic plants, or bizarre animals scurrying around. Just regular old trees and rolling green hills as far as the eye could see.

“Whelp,” he said, adjusting his duffel bag and sniper rifle case on his back. “It’s go time.”

“Obviously,” BLCK replied snarkily before he climbed into the tear, pushing aside the strings in his way. He tore down a few that were still holding it together and the gash in the air grew just slightly bigger. Khalil scowled at his back, mockingly mouthing ‘obviously’, before following him, though he took care to not tear anymore strings. They really didn’t need anymore Fae coming into their world. It was becoming a nuisance.

Khalil’s first experience of the Land of the Fae was a gentle step and slow release of breath when nothing jumped out to eat him. He knelt in the sweet smelling grass and swung his duffel bag over his shoulder, zipping it open and pulling out a handgun, swiftly loading it.

BLCK scoffed at the weapon in his hands when he caught up with him, but Khalil didn’t dignify it with a response, choosing instead to take the high road and glare.

“What’s our first move,” Khalil asked, even though it brought a sour taste to his mouth to have to follow BLCK’s orders and turn to him for command. There was something about having to listen to him that was worse than having to work under literally any other robot.

“We search for a Fae, catch them, and make them tell us who their leader is, where they reside, and any rumors about a human crossing over to their world. We will then make them take us to their leaders hiding place and infiltrate. We kill I-102 and their leader, depending on who we find first. Throw them into turmoil and panic. We drain as many as we can before retreating back to our world,” BLCK said swiftly. Khalil wanted to scoff. It sounded like he had practiced in front of a mirror.

He swallowed the noise though, and nodded in confirmation. “We have three LFDs in my bag,” he informed him. If BLCK had been able to scowl, Khalil was sure he would have been on the receiving end of one deadly look.

“Only three?”

“Seriously? It’s not like I have unlimited room in my goddamn duffel bag, and given how heavy they are it would have been impractical to bring any more.”

“The limits of the human mind and body never cease to astound me.”

“One more word and I’ll put a bullet in your carbon fiber skull, rust bucket.”

BLCK threw a punch almost faster than Khalil could react. Almost. He ducked the blow and cocked back his gun, stepping in close and pressing the barrel against BLCK’s chest. Before he could pull the trigger, BLCK grabbed the back of his jacket and yanked him back, throwing him into a tree.

Khalil landed hard on the ground, the wind knocked out of him. BLCK crossed over to him with only two strides of his unnaturally long legs and fisted his hand in the front of Khalil’s shirt, lifting him off the ground so they were face to face.

“You are under my command, Khalil,” he shouted, his voice staticky and more pissed than Khalil had ever heard it. Instead of feeling fear, however, he only felt a smug sort of pride at being able to get him to drop his annoying Holier-Than-Thou facade. “You will obey me. You are nothing but a replaceable human. Do not think you are so special that I will not kill you without hesitation.”

Khalil couldn’t stop the laugh that bubbled passed his lips. “Don’t talk to me about “replaceable”, robot,” he hissed, the venom in his words stinging his lips, and he pulled the trigger. The bullet blew a hole in BLCK’s upper thigh, sending him stumbling back, cursing. He dropped Khalil, who sat on the ground, back to the tree, cackling.

BLCK collapsed and Khalil stood, sliding his gun into the holster on his upper thigh. He walked over to BLCK and kicked him. BLCK reached up and grasped his ankle, yanking hard and knocking Khalil over.

“Son of a--” Khalil coughed. BLCK dragged himself back up and limped over to his own duffel bag, which had been dropped in the scuffle. He sat down next to it and clicked a button on the side of his leg, which caused the whole thing to pop right off. He opened his duffel bag and pulled out a small black metal rectangle. He pressed and indention in the center and it unfolded into an entirely new leg. Khalil stopped watching after that.

He thunked his head back down onto the ground and groaned. Not even five minutes into the mission and he had already insulted and shot his superior officer. He didn’t even want to imagine what was going to happen an hour in.

 

____________________________________

 

A long time ago, back when Irma was still I-102 and only I-102, he had a revelation.

He had been, the best of his knowledge, around 15 years old when it happened. I-102 had been an unfortunately curious soul, a trait the robots tried their best to beat or scare out of all of their workers, but they hadn’t quite managed to knock out of him. Not that they knew that. To their knowledge, I-102 was the picture of obedience, because though he had questions, he also knew how to keep his mouth shut and his chin placed firmly on his chest.

He had his revelation one day when he was working in the boiler room because the higher up humans were complaining about having cold water in their baths like a bunch of wimps. I-102 and his fellow Class C workers had to deal with ice water for their two minute long showers and they never complained. Mostly because they knew if they did, they would be promptly silenced, but that wasn’t really the point.

He had been practically finished when he had his epiphany, sitting there in the dark of the boiler room, his only company the slow plonk of drops of some mysterious substance hitting the cold concrete floor in even, one second intervals.

I-102 was afraid. He was so afraid that he didn’t even feel it anymore. In fact, he didn’t think there had been a single day in his life where he hadn’t been scared for his life.

He thought about it some more, trying to pinpoint exactly why he was so afraid, and he came to the conclusion that he was afraid of having his thoughts, his choices, his free will taken away from him. To not be able to control his limbs or his words, well.

I-102 thought that that would be a fate worse than death.

Irma had to agree.

Marley spoke his name, sharp and commanding, and the sound echoed through his head, banging around in his skull like a gong. Words he knew he shouldn’t speak formed in his throat, scraping against his mouth like bloody thorns, tearing his tongue to ribbons and shoving their way past his lips.

“I built the cages Lias, James, and you were kept in. I built LFDs, though I was never told what they did. I built the weapons the Class B and Class A use, as well as some of the tools that the interrogator uses. I built the traps used to capture the Fae as they cross into our territory. I was the head Engineer. I had a hand in building almost everything you saw in the Organization,” Irma admitted, breaths coming hard and heavy. The words sounded almost mechanical, hollow. It didn’t sound like his voice at all.

Irma barely registered what Marley and Jeon did next, if they yelled or charged him or if they just watched him, shock and disgust twisting their features, watching him with dark eyes that pierced his skin like needles with string threaded through, twining around his bones and jerking him like a puppet.

His entire body rebelled at the thought and he gagged, doubling over.

“What did you do to me?” he demanded, hating how his voice shook and cracked. He looked up to find Jeon barely restraining Marley who looked positively feral, teeth bared like she was fully intending to rip his throat out with them. Irma wasn’t sure if he would have tried to stop her. Jeon glared at him with cold eyes, their lips thinned into a line of displeasure.

“You gave us your full name,” Jeon said, their voice hard as stone and twice as unforgiving. “In the Land of the Fae, names have power. If given to the wrong person, they hold sway over your actions and can force you to speak the truth.”

Strangely enough, Irma didn’t feel the fear he thought he would have at those words. Instead, he only felt anger. Searing, burning anger that raged through his blood and left a charred, smoking mess behind, tearing though his mind until the haze didn’t allow him to think straight anymore.

He wasn’t entirely sure what expression he was making, but it twisted his features into shapes he didn’t recognize. His eyes burned, but he didn’t feel any tears trying to force their way out.

Jeon gasped, their mask shattering like glass, eyes blowing wide with confusion and apprehension. Their grip on Marley loosened, but it didn’t matter as Marley had gone slack herself, her jaw cracked open and her axe dangling, forgotten, by her side.

“What the hell are you?” Marley whispered.

“What am I?” Irma repeated, his voice low and dangerous, different but still undoubtedly his. Not like the hollow shell it had been. It was a small comfort. “I’m mad. No, I’ve graduated beyond mad. I’m furious, vengeful, enraged, and any and all words synonymous.”

Jeon took a slow step back, dragging Marley, who had lit up in response to Irma’s anger, her own simmering just below the surface, with them.

“You think you’re intimidating, Enderal?” Marley shouted, trying to break Jeon’s grip. “I don’t care if your eyes glow or if you grow fangs! You don’t scare me!”

“Marley would you shut up!” Jeon snapped. “Get out, now!”

They didn’t wait for a response before they yanked open the door and bodily threw her out, turning around and facing Irma one last time. They didn’t say anything, just watched him, and Irma could almost see the gears turning in their head underneath the fear.

It felt good to not be the one afraid anymore.

They slammed the door behind them and Irma was left alone, locked in a room with too much rage and too little space. His skin felt tight and uncomfortable, something simmering just beneath the tawny expanse, pushing up and begging to be let out.

Irma felt the heat pooling in his fingertips and palms, felt a scream or maybe a sob building in his throat. It felt like everything in his life had been building up to this moment, every choked off wail, all the repressed anger, all the fear accumulated in his heart, poisoning him, or maybe fortifying him, all leading to this explosion of power.

In that moment, Irma, no longer I-102, had another realization:

He liked not being afraid.

He liked the power it brought to his fingertips, he liked the way his blood turned to fire, and he liked how invincible it made him feel. He wanted more.

Irma took a slow breath, held it, and released, somehow unsurprised to see smoke billow out of him and not air. It wouldn’t have made sense to see anything else, given the wildfire burning in him. He raised his hands and looked at them. They glowed red hot, his fingernails sharpened into points and glowing like stars, white and blinding.

He turned them outward, palms facing the door. He felt a grin crack his face, felt his teeth burn where they hit his lips.

The door slammed open. Irma snarled, furious at the interruption, and saw the Queen standing, framed by the doorway, her staff held high in front of her. The crystal topping the ash wood glowed harshly, white and blinding. Irma flinched and covered his eyes, a growl ripping from his lips.

He peeked through his fingers and saw the Queen’s face. She looked ethereal, her eyes glowing with a power Irma couldn’t begin to fully understand. Her wings extended fully and they only served to make her look even more like a vengeful goddess, beautiful and oh so terrible. Her blue dress billowed around her, and just past it, Irma could see Ahalm and James, flanking the Queen, weapons at the ready.

Irma took a step forward -- there was a yelled incantation, a flash of light -- and Irma saw nothing more.

_________________________________

At first, there were only flashes, of sound, of colors, of tastes. He heard a whispered apology, though he couldn’t tell if it was aimed at him or someone else. He felt power thrumming in his body, subdued and quiet, no longer the boiling mess it had been. At one point he was fairly certain someone had run their hand through his hair while arguing quietly with a different person.

He didn’t remember much of what had landed him unconscious, and what he did came to him in dreams, in hot flares and burning anger, in a feeling like chaos. He saw purple hair and shimmery wings, heard yelled words and promises of violence he was all too happy to meet.

Irma awoke on a stiff bed, something cold surrounding his hands and wrapped around his chest and stomach. He let out a low groan, his head thudding with each beat of his heart. He slowly cracked his eyes open and glanced around at the room he had been placed in.

It was dark, no crystal illuminating the place like the room he had been in previously. The only light source came from a long table across from his bed, which held three round bottles standing in a line, all glowing with the same dim purple light. He shifted his sight to the right and saw a metal door, bars across the little window at the top of it. Actually, now that he was looking around, Irma saw the entire room was metal. It was almost comforting to be back amongst his element, if he ignored the fact that he was almost definitely a prisoner of war now.

He attempted to sit up, but the cold around his chest and hands stopped him before he could get far. Irma looked down and saw honest to god ice encasing his body. It shimmered in the low light, the purple shade dancing across the glistening bonds.

“What the hell…” Irma murmured, tugging lightly at the ice. It wasn’t burning cold as he would have expected it to be, instead kind of room temperature, just barely leaning on the cold side of things. He lifted his legs, surprised to find them free and unbound.

He sighed heavily through his nose and lowered his legs, and flexed his fingers, trying to find the power he had seen in quick snatches of dreams while he was asleep. There was a gentle thrumming, but before he could try to build it up, the door opened with a click, and in walked Ahalm, carrying a plate with food on it. His war hammer was hanging at his waist, and he looked utterly exhausted. His dread locked hair, which, last Irma had seen him, had been pulled back into a ponytail was now loose around his shoulders, ending just above his chest, and there were dark circles around his eyes, so deep Irma thought for a second he had been given matching black eyes.

They met eyes and Ahalm jumped, obviously not expecting Irma to be awake. Irma offered an awkward smile, but Ahalm didn’t return it, instead regarding him a cool gaze, face smoothing itself of any indication of emotion. Irma’s smile dropped as he was suddenly reminded of the conversation Marley had forced out of him - and didn’t that thought make him want to claw out his own tongue.

 _‘I built the cages Lias, James, and you were kept in. I built LFDs, though I was never told what they did. I built the weapons the Class B and Class A use, as well as some of the tools that the interrogator uses. I built the traps used to capture the Fae as they cross into our territory. I was the head Engineer. I had a hand in building almost everything you saw in the Organization,’_ he remembered saying. Irma squeezed his eyes shut and prayed for a quick and painless death when they finally decided how to execute him.

“Eat,” Ahalm said, startling Irma out of his thoughts. He glanced over at the Fae, who was holding out a piece of what Irma was assuming was some sort of fruit. It was a weird color, bright red, with black seeds speckled throughout.

“What’s that?” Irma asked, then immediately cleared his throat, because _holy hell my voice is hoarse_. He tried again, his voice coming out much clearer this time.

“Watermelon,” Ahalm replied, his voice cold and clipped. Irma swallowed something that tasted a little like disappointment at the tone, though he wasn’t entirely sure why. Maybe he had thought Ahalm might not hate him, at least not as much as the others obviously did. Oh, well. It seemed like that bridge had burnt before it had even been built.

“Eat,” Ahalm said again, holding the watermelon a bit closer to Irma’s mouth. Surprisingly, the sweet scent of the watermelon didn’t induce any tummy rumbles like it probably should have. In fact, the more Irma looked at it, the less hungry he got.

“I’d rather not,” Irma replied cautiously. His gut had never lied to him before, and now it was feeling a kind of nauseous that felt way deeper than it should be, as if every fiber of his entire being was rejecting the thought of eating the food Ahalm was offering him. Even though Irma was fairly sure he hadn't eaten since before he had been brought to the Land of the Fae, he definitely didn’t feel hungry. The fruit felt like some sort of trap, as stupid as that sounded.

Ahalm stared intently at him, and for a second Irma thought Ahalm was going to force feed him the watermelon. Then Ahalm sighed and placed the melon back down on the plate, and placed the plate on the floor by his feet, as there was no desk or side table next to the bed. His amber wings fluttered agitatedly behind him and he looked like he wanted to sit down, but, of course, there was no chair in the room. They were really keeping it minimalist.

“What the hell happened when you talked to Marley and Princess Jeon, Irma?” Ahalm finally said after a period of silence. Irma started slightly, not expecting him to actually talk to him like a normal person, and not in short, one word phrases. He felt a little nervous hearing his name from a Fae again, but when there was no tugging sensation in his gut, he relaxed slightly.

“Man, I don’t know,” Irma said, his voice low. “I don’t remember much beyond Marley forcing conversation.”

Ahalm made a sound in the back of his throat, something between a whimper and a growl. “I’m sorry that happened,” he said quietly. “Being forced into something against your will - it’s not a punishment I would wish on my worst enemy.”

“Well, it wasn’t your fault,” Irma responded, a bit blindsided by the compassion. He hadn’t expected it from someone who knew the hand Irma played in hurting his friends, his entire species, actually. “Uh, you are aware of what I did, right?”

Ahalm raised an eyebrow. “You mean, am I aware that you had a hand in building every weapon used against us, as well as the cages that kept my best friends trapped and the instruments that interrogator used to hurt them?”

Irma swallowed heavily, unable to meet Ahalm’s eyes. “Yep,” he mumbled in a small voice. Ahalm sighed again and rubbed a hand across his face, pinching the bridge of his nose.

“I’m not as… impulsive as Marley,” he started. “But I can’t deny that when I heard the news, I wanted to kill you as badly as she did.”

“Wow, what a charmer,” Irma muttered. He thought he saw a quick grin crossed Ahalm’s lips, but Irma was pretty he was just hallucinating.

“However, once I had calmed down and heard the rest of the story from Heir Jeon, I think I understand. I remember you telling me that, had you stayed in the Human Realm after what had happened, you would have been killed. That you were dispensable. This, paired with what Heir Jeon thinks made you lose control and fly into a rage, leads me to believe that you built what you did because you weren’t given a choice in the matter,” he finished, leveling Irma with a knowing look. “Am I close?”

Irma was quiet for a moment, staring openly, his jaw hanging open. “Damn dude,” he finally whispered, not able to muster anything above that. “You should be a detective.”

Ahalm cracked a grin. “I sort of am. It’s part of my job as the Captain of the Royal Guard.”

“Huh.” It was quiet for a moment before Irma looked back down at the ice encasing his torso and hands, suddenly aware that is was much colder than before. “So, uh, as long as you’re in the mood to answer questions, what’s with the ice?”

“It’s to suppress your powers.”

“Oh.” Silence fell for a moment again. “What powers?”

“Fire powers.”

“Goddammit Ahalm.”

Ahalm simply smiled, and Irma thought it was entirely unfair how attractive that smile was. Then he shoved that thought to the very back of his mind, in the dark part where questions like ‘What does it feel like to be killed?’ and ‘Am I going to die forgotten?’ resided.

Ahalm bent and picked up the still full plate from the floor. He looked at it, then back to Irma, seeming like he was going to say something. Then he shook his head and walked to the door. He opened it before turning his head to Irma.

“The Queen will be arriving shortly,” he said before he slipped out and shut the door, locking Irma in, once again alone with his thoughts and the ice that was slowly numbing his chest and arms.

He shivered.


	6. Chapter 6

Ahalm didn’t know what to make of Irma. On one hand, he was human (at least partially), and humans were the enemy, for all intents and purposes. But, on the other, Irma clearly didn’t seem to want to hurt them. In fact, it seemed that Irma mostly wanted, well. Nothing. That was the best way Ahalm could think to put it. Irma wanted absolutely nothing from them, in the long run. There were probably more pressing things that he wanted, obviously, like freedom, or human food, but Ahalm felt they could just leave him alone forever and he would be perfectly happy.

He pondered all of this as he marched his way to the guards quarters, where Jeon had escorted Marley after the whole, ‘holy-shit-fire-magic’ debacle. Ahalm had to swallow back the sigh that threatened to erupt from his lips when he thought of the upcoming conversation he was going to have to have with her.

Marley wasn’t a bad soldier. In fact, she was one of the best. She was strong, smart, and incredibly loyal. She wasn’t bad Fae either. Marley cared deeply for everyone she called a friend, and was always there with a not exactly typical comforting word. The only problem (excluding her tendency to set things on fire or straight up explode them with alchemical experiments that Ahalm couldn’t even begin to understand) was her temper. The girl had anger issues, what could he say.

He flew down the last couple flights of stairs, his wings aching from the strain of being in almost constant use for the past couple of days, either folded down uncomfortably underneath his coat, or him being out and about, what with the rescue mission and then the subsequent arrival of Irma keeping him constantly on his toes. He’d hardly had time to take even a five minute break.

He was so looking forward to crashing face first into his bed.

Ahalm landed in front of the wooden door of the guards quarters and pushed it open. The electric lights were already on, humming softly. The lower levels didn’t bother with the whole ‘crystalline chandeliers shining with magical light’ shtick. It was mostly just to put up appearances for outsiders anyway, and they - the outsiders - didn’t normally go to the bottom of the Great Tree, and as such, didn’t see the large, ironically crystal run, generators hidden in the roots. He could see Marley sitting at one of the desks, one hand holding up her head, the other messing around with a vial of viscous, glowing liquid. Her wings were drooped behind her, twitching slightly every now and then.

Ahalm walked over to her and pulled up a chair.

“Alright, I’m just gonna cut to the chase,” he said. “What the hell, Mavis? You know full well that I don’t condon the usage of name magic under my command. You know that it is only to be used in the most severe, last resort moments. What, exactly, struck you as ‘last resort’ in a prisoner answering questions in an orderly fashion?”

Marley didn’t respond at first, tossing the vial in the air a few more times. Then she sat it down with a thunk. “You know, I saw some pretty messed up shit when I was in that goddamn prison. I saw Fae go into that Room and not come out. I don’t know what happened to them. There’s only one door in and out. It’s like they just vanished. I saw Fae die in their cages because they had been stuck on that side of the Veil for weeks, and I was only in there for, what, three, four days? I saw Lias dragged in and out of that Room, looking worse each time. I didn’t even know what happened to James. He fought back once, and he was removed from the equation entirely. The only contact I really had was with the Interrogator and the goddamn Human who caught us. So, yeah, I acted a little out of sorts. In fact, I probably shouldn’t have gone with Jeon at all in the first place. I can accept that. I can even admit my mistake in letting my emotions control my actions, and I’m almost sorry that I forced him into doing something against his will.” She looked up at Ahalm, her eyes tired but firm. “Not because I thought it hurt him, but because it betrayed your trust in me.”

Ahalm stayed silent, his hands clasped together between his knees. Marley look a breath.

“The fact is, I don’t think he would have told us what he did without the influence of magic. I also think that what we learned is pretty important.” She leaned back in her chair, and her face contorted, as if she couldn’t believe what she was about to say. “We need a way to close the Veil, right?”

Ahalm squinted at her. “Yes,” he said, unsure of where she was going with this.

“Well, we have the opal knives, the OKs, if you will--”

“I won’t.”

Marley rolled her eyes at him. “The problem is, we can’t figure out how to make them big enough to seal the tear in the Veil. Well, what do you call someone who fixes things?”

“An engineer,” Ahalm gasped, finally catching on. He paused. “I mean, that’s really a pretty broad definition of an engineer, and kind of not correct, but I get what you’re saying.”

Marley snapped her fingers and gave him a finger gun. “Exactly,” she said, ignoring the last part completely. “The only problem with this plan is that he has no idea how magic works at all, and here, the mechanical side of things is pretty closely tied in with the magical. I was thinking--”

“That you could help him with it, great idea Marley!” Ahalm cut her off. Marley looked startled.

“Uh, no, I was thinking--”

“Yeah, Lias and James can totally help with this, too,” he interrupted again. Marley now looked kind of scared.

“Ahalm, think about what you’re doing--”

“I’ll go tell the Queen and the rest immediately,” he shouted as he stood, a shit eating grin on his face.

“Ahalm, please--”

“Nope, it’s decided. Think of this as your punishment for breaking my trust.”

“Oh, c’mon, that was a low blow!”

Ahalm pretend not to hear her, whistling a jaunty tune as he waltzed out the door, amber wings flared high in amusement. Marley stared at the door once it had swung shut, then buried her head in her hands, groaning low in her throat.

“What have I done?”

 

________________________

 

Irma wasn’t quite sure what to expect when the Queen arrived at this cell. A part of him was pretty sure she was going to kill him, flat out. The other part thought she might keep him alive, but only to experiment on him to find out what the hell he was and what he did back before she had magicked him unconscious.

He was pretty sure that had been her. He hoped it had been her and he hadn’t just fainted dead away. That would have been embarrassing.

What he was not expecting was her melting his icy bonds as soon as she walked in. He blinked in surprise, shivering at the sudden wash of cold water over his torso and hands, and sat up, plucking at his damp shirt to try and get some warm air between his skin and the cold material.

The Queen gazed down at him dispassionately, her enormous wings catching the light from the vials on the table and casting beautiful patterns of light across the room, wavering and swirling like water as they twitched ever so lightly now and again.

“So,” Irma said, awkwardly clearing this throat. “What’s with the ice restraints?” A joke was on the tip of his tongue, but Irma had just enough self preservational instincts to keep it lodged firmly in this throat.

“It’s a crude way to keep your powers contained,” she said, her voice deep and dark as the ocean, unspoken words heavy as cinderblock shoes. Irma wasn’t actually expecting her to respond though, so he supposed it was as good as anything. “The ice is placed where your fire is born and released and tempers it before it can be formed.”

“Hey, yeah, there’s another question,” Irma said, swinging his feet over the side of the bed he was laying on so they rested, flat footed, on the ground. “What in god’s name am I?!”

The Queen somehow managed to convey the awkwardness of being forced to answer a vaguely rude question while also keeping all the regality that she, as Queen, possessed. It was fascinating to watch in real time because, though her face never moved, her wings fluttered sharply several times before she could still them, and even then, tiny shivers rushed through them every now and them, sending the patterns of light dancing around them.

“To answer that question in depth, we would need to go several hundred years back in the history of every being that lives in this land. However, since I owe you nothing, and since I don’t feel like dipping into the past, I shall give you the short of it,” she said, the juxtaposition of her kind of crude words and her commanding tone throwing Irma for a loop for a hot second. “You are a hybrid.”

Irma waited for her to continue. She didn’t.

“Oh, come on!” He exclaimed. She raised an eyebrow. “Oh my god, a hybrid of what?” Irma threw up his hands. “You can’t drop a bombshell like that and then not continue!”

She remained silent for a moment more, as if to prove that yes, actually, she could. Finally, she said, “A hybrid of a human and a Sprite. More specifically, a Fire Sprite.”

“Thank you,” Irma said, mostly to keep himself from dwelling on what the fact that _holy shit holy shit I’m not human_ was doing to his brain and what exactly that meant for him. The only clear thing that this definitely meant was that he absolutely could not go back to his world. They would capture him and do weird experiments to him, maybe try to get him to use his powers to fuel their mechanical domination. They would enslave him and work him until he died, and Irma was very firmly against that idea. He swallowed. “So… what now?”

The Queen took a measured breath that on anyone else would have been a deep, vaguely annoyed sigh. She folded her hands behind her back and lifted her chin just slightly so that she was glaring at Irma down her nose. She pursed her lips. Irma sweated. They sat in contemplative silence for a minute or two before Irma finally broke the staring contest they were having, flicking his eyes to the right. The Queen seemed to come to some sort of conclusion and she turned her back on him.

“Now, Enderel, you have a choice,” she said. She paused a moment for dramatic effect, Irma supposed. The Fae seemed like rather dramatic creatures. “You can remain in this cell, a captive until you die, with no one but yourself for company--”

“I’ll take the other option,” Irma interrupted.

The Queen looked over her shoulder at him, her stare cold enough to freeze fire. Irma flinched, ducking his head in apology, nervous sweat trailing icy fingers down his scalp. He hoped he hadn’t just written up and signed his own death warrant. “Or you can work with us to find a way to close the veil for good.”

“Yeah, no, I’m sticking with my original choice,” Irma hopped up, stretching and rubbing his hips and thighs, trying to get his blood circulating. He stretched his arms above his head and faced the Queen, placing his hands on his hips and leaning backwards to try and crack his back, which was not feeling the best after laying so long on what was basically a glorified surgeon's table.

The Queen didn’t quite curl her lip, but it was a close thing, and she strode to the door, grabbing the handles and throwing it open with all the grace a monarch could muster. Irma wondered if she was putting on a show to intimidate him or if that was really how she acted on the daily. It seemed exhausting to be that extra all the time, if it really was her actual personality.

“You will be required to attend a delegation of the four major powers in this land in a day’s time,” she said before she left. “Captain Ahalm will be in shortly to escort you to your fitting, to get you… proper clothes.” She cast a judgmental eye at his dirty and stained uniform with a disdainful sniff, and Irma pulled at a small hole in the leg of his pants, trying not to feel too self conscious.

The door slammed behind her and Irma was left alone to once again ponder all of his life choices. He pulled a hand through his hair and made a face when his fingers came away oily and gross feeling, strands of hair tangled around the digits from where they got caught in the many, many tangles. He wiped his hand on his tattered shirt, not that it really helped, and sat back down on the bed.

Irma rested his elbows on his knees and buried his face in his hands, taking slow, deep breathes, trying to find some semblance of calm in the absolute fuckstorm that his life had become. Irma prided himself on being adaptable and able to roll with the punches as they came, but this whole episode was really testing his limits. This wasn’t a shift change, or a routine toss up, or even the loss of a limb. No, those he could handle - i.e., bottle it up and shove it underneath the bed of Neglect and ignore it until it ceased to be a problem. But this - this unmoored him, ripped out every semblance of control he thought he had, and threw it to the wind like it was confetti. Everything he had been taught was turning around, prejudice and barbed tipped hatred no longer aiming at some unseen, faceless enemy, but at him, because he was everything he had been taught to hate, and now he really, truly had no one.

He was alone, and it scared the shit out of him.

He wasn’t sure how long it had been since he had felt like I-102 and nothing but I-102. He could practically feel himself reverting back into a nameless number amongst thousands like him, someone expendable, someone more machine than the actual robots that he followed blindly. He felt a lump build in his chest, rising up into his throat and just. Sitting there. He was stuck in an in between place, not enough energy to cry and not enough willpower to shove it back underneath that stupid fucking bed.

I-102 took another deep breath and held it, closing his eyes and letting his emotions wash over him, let them run their course until they shrank themselves into small enough packets to properly handle, could properly repress, if he was generous enough to speak in truths.

I-102 raised his head and let Irma take the back seat for a moment, let him regain himself. He glanced around the room with dispassionate eyes and stood, pressing his finger tips together in front of him and taking comfort in the normality the slight pressure brought to his scrambled mind. He closed his eyes and searched inside himself, making sure everything was intact, making sure it was safe enough for Irma to resurface.

In the end, it didn’t matter if Irma was ready, or if it was safe, because there was a loud rapping knock on the door and Irma surged forward and settled back into the front seat with barely a hitch of his breath, and I-102 slipped back into the dark.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hey, thanks for reading! Tell me if you enjoyed it!

**Author's Note:**

> To anyone waiting on an update for Cults and Robbers -- don't worry! I'm working on it! I just needed a small break from it because I was stuck in a rut, and I decided I wanted to share this one with the world. The next chapter is coming, but it might be a little while until I can pick it up again. I haven't forgot!


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